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Earth, Trees and Toilet Paper

Toilet paper is serious business. It’s genuinely a severely overlooked and under-appreciated medium of information distribution; believe that! Fortunately, http://www.getshitter.com can assist in elevating toilet paper to a more appropriate level of respect, by taking your twitter feed and turning it into toilet paper. What you subsequently do with said toilet paper would then be completely up to you.

As we all learned from the classic Pauly Shore cinematic masterpiece Bio-Dome, the most effective means of instituting change, or raising awareness, is to think globally and act locally. The month of April contains both Earth Day (April 22nd) and Arbor Day (April 27th). As you may already know, back in 2008 HostGator took the initiative of becoming a Green webhost, which you can read even more about here. With environmentalism in the air this month, we thought it would be appropriate to discuss toilet paper and the trees that make toilet paper possible. Because like toilet paper, trees are also serious business.

I’m going to stop beating around the bush, not because a bush could potentially make for decent TP, but because toilet paper conservation is something that deserves significantly more attention than it presently receives. At least once per day, you hold in your hand a number of 4.25 inch squares that could change the world, if you held less of them at a time. Twenty-seven thousand trees give their lives daily to supply the world with toilet paper. That is not a typo; that’s a 27, followed by a comma and 3 zeros. Don’t take my word for it; go ask National Geographic.

Thinking globally may lead you to discover General Sherman, a giant sequoia tree located in the Giant Forest of Sequoia National Park in Tulare County, California. The General is one of the tallest, widest, longest-lived and most famous trees in existence, therefore unlikely to ever become toilet paper. Another unlikely TP candidate would be a certain White Cedar located in the Great Lakes area of Canada: it’s 155 years old and less than 4 inches tall.

In acting locally, we began here in our own offices by purchasing GetShitter toilet paper for our restrooms to further educate all HostGator employees on trees and toilet paper conservation. To see the twitter feed we used for this purpose, click here, and please be sure that you are not easily-offended by juvenile bathroom humor… after all, Gators can be found in the sewers from time to time…

Now that we’ve appropriately addressed thinking globally and acting locally, we’re on a roll (so to speak)! How though can we thus act globally? Our thoughts turned to our HostGator India office, India being widely known for having a culture that does not utilize toilet paper. In the spirit of educating, enlightening and raising awareness about environmental issues, we present this series of photos to explain how that culture accomplishes this goal:

How is showing you those pictures acting globally, you ask? Well, it’s not. But encouraging you to adopt the same behavior is! Because if we want to change the world, and save some trees, then we need to take action; one ply at a time! Interestingly, the above-pictured method is considered even more sanitary than using toilet paper.

The Arbor Day Foundation began in 1972 and now plants and distributes more than 10 million trees annually. Earth Day began in 1970 and is largely credited with launching the modern environmental movement. Please visit both of their websites to further educate yourself about potentially making a difference that could impact the entire world. What’s been around longer than both Earth Day and the Arbor Day Foundation, combined? Toilet paper, which dates back to the 6th century AD, in early medieval China. Feel free to print that fact on your roll of GetShitter.com toilet paper! Happy Earth Day and Happy Arbor Day from HostGator!

Hence why I buy, and carry wet wipes. I use less wipes than I do TP, and it does a way cleaner job.

Brad Mann

23 April 2012 at
5:34 am

I have nothing to say in response to the comment below me, other than…”It’s below me.”

fjpoblam

23 April 2012 at
8:27 am

They’re sort of pricey, but some toilet makers, e.g. Toto, offer toilets with seats that shoot water, eliminating or at least reducing the need for toilet paper. (Totos are also both low flow and offer dual flush, one for number one and one for number two.)

Jesus Manuel Sandoval-Serrano

23 April 2012 at
11:36 am

Those are known is bidet’s

fjpoblam

23 April 2012 at
11:49 am

Well, similar. I’m familiar with a bidet. But a bidet is (according to our salesman) different from this on our Toto, on which it’s considered an “upgraded seat”. Semantics, I guess.

alliegladson

25 April 2012 at
1:41 am

See….not all of third world countries’ and also lower class’ behaviour is NOT classy. We know how to save the world better than western people. Not only just know, we DO it. :D

Mary79

5 November 2012 at
3:41 pm

Another way to help save trees is by using green toilet paper made from bamboo. One brand that I have been using is Bum Boosa. Instead of being made from trees, it is made from bamboo, which is a lot more sustainable. The toilet paper is made from 100% bamboo processed with the mechanical pulping method. It is tree-free, biodegradable, BPA-free, elemental chlorine-free and it breaks down quickly. Even the packaging is made from recycled paper. I find that it is really soft and the paper is thick, so it doesn’t tear easily. The best part is that they plant a tree for every 4 rolls sold.